Turn On or Off Cortana Contacts, Email, Calendar, and Communication Permissions in Windows 10

This tutorial is no longer valid starting with Windows 10 version 2004.

Cortana is your cloud-based personal assistant that works across your devices and other Microsoft services. Depending on the capabilities of your device and the version of Cortana you’re using, Cortana can provide a range of features, some of which are personalized. Cortana on Windows is available in certain regions and languages. If Cortana isn’t available for your Windows device, you can still search for files on your device in the search box on the taskbar. Cortana is also available on other platforms, such as Android and iOS, in select markets.

Cortana works best when you sign in and let her use data from your device, other Microsoft services, and third-party services you choose to connect. To provide you with personalized experiences, Cortana learns from certain data about you, such as your searches, calendar, contacts, and location. You’re in control of how much data you share. If you choose not to sign into Cortana on Windows, you can still chat with Cortana and use her to help you search the web, documents stored in Microsoft services like OneDrive, and your Windows device. See the section about Windows Search in the Privacy Statement for more information. If you don’t sign in, or you choose to sign out, your experiences will be more limited and they won’t be personalized with your Cortana data. On iOS and Android devices, Cortana only works when you sign in.

To personalize your experience and provide the best possible suggestions, Cortana accesses your email and other communications and collects data about your contacts (People) like their title and/or suffix, first name, last name, middle name, nicknames, and company name. If you receive and/or call, email, or text someone, Cortana collects that person’s email address or phone number.

Cortana helps you bridge the gap between text messaging on your phone and instant messaging on your PC (mobile messaging rates may apply). When you’ve signed in on your PC and your phone with the same Microsoft account, you can create a new text message on your PC and Cortana will help you send the text from your phone. In the same way, Cortana can notify you on your PC when you miss a call on your phone and help you reply to the caller with a text message right from your PC.

You can manage permissions for what Cortana can see and use for your account in Windows 10.

You can choose to let Cortana access your device and cloud-based email and other communications, your calendar, and your contacts in order to enable additional features and personalization. If you give permission, Cortana will access additional data including:

• Text messages and email. Cortana accesses your messages to do a variety of things such as: allowing you to add events to your calendar, apprising you of important messages, and keeping you up to date on events or other things that are important to you, like package or flight tracking. Cortana also uses your messages to help you with planning around your events and offers other helpful suggestions and recommendations.
• Communications History. Cortana learns who is most important to you from your call, text message, and email history. This data is used to keep track of people most relevant to you and your preferred methods of communication, flag important messages for you (such as missed calls), and improve the performance of Cortana features such as speech recognition.
• Calendar appointments. Cortana access your calendars in order to provide reminders and information relevant to your appointments.

For more information, see:

• Cortana, Search, and privacy: FAQ - Microsoft Windows
  
• Microsoft Privacy Statement - Microsoft privacy

This tutorial will show you how to turn on or off Cortana permissions for using your contacts, calendar details, email and content, and communication history from messages and apps in Windows 10.

You will need to sign in to Cortana with your Microsoft account to be able to turn on allowing Cortana to use your contacts, email, calendar, & communication history.



Here's How:

1. Open Settings, and click/tap on the Cortana icon.

2. Click/tap on Permissions on the left side, and click/tap on the Manage the information Cortana can access from this device link under Permissions on the right side. (see screenshot below)

3. Turn On or Off (default) Contacts, email, calendar & communication history for what you want. (see screenshot below)

4. When finished, you can close Settings if you like.



That's it,
Shawn

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